首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
Where was the letter probably placed many years ago?
Where was the letter probably placed many years ago?
admin
2019-10-21
42
问题
Where was the letter probably placed many years ago?
Today we take it for granted that the mail will be delivered daily at our door. But many years ago it might have been placed in a tree trunk or underneath a rock. In the early days of the mail no one could be sure about where or when it would arrive.
At the southern tip of Africa there was once a post office under a rock. In the old days the route from England to India was around the Cape of Good Hope. The journey was stormy and dangerous. It took six long months. Sailors often wished to send mail home, but they seldom met ships bound back to England. So at the cape the sailors would go ashore. They headed for a certain large stone. On the stone were scratched the words "Look hereunder for letters. " They would leave their letters there, knowing that the next homeward-bound ship would stop and pick them up.
There was another post office like this at the southern tip of South America. During the gold rush days, boats sailed around Cape Horn to California. At Cape Horn was a keg nailed to a post. Boats coming from the east coast would send a small boat ashore to this post office. They picked up any letters in the keg. At the same time they mailed letters home that boats sailing east could pick up.
In the state of Washington stands the stump of a huge cedar. It, too, was once a post office. Settlers needed a place for the mail carriers to leave their letters. Their houses were so widely scattered that the mail carrier could not reach all of them, and the post office was far away over rough roads. So the settlers found a tree that stood where several trails crossed. They cut the tree down ten feet from the ground, hollowed it out, and covered it with a roof. Inside, they nailed a row of wooden boxes. Each box was marked with a family’ s name. The mail carrier could leave letters there for everyone for miles around.
For the first few years after the English colonists came to America, there was no regular postal service. People gave their letters to any traveler who happened to be going in the right direction. Often they gave them to a peddler or a traveling shoemaker. When the traveler reached the town where the letter was going, he might stop at an inn. He would leave the letters there. But there they stayed until the person they were addressed to happened to come by and stopped at the inn.
What about places like Virginia where there were very few inns? People who wished to send letters would leave them at one of the large plantations. The owners of the plantation would then send the letters on to a neighbor. The neighbor would do the same. It was a slow mail system.
After many years, regular mail carriers on horseback were hired. They went from one big town to another. Between New York and Boston, for example, there was one "postrider" a month. He traveled only by day and took two weeks for the trip. Often the postrider left all the mail for a whole town at a crossroads store. It still took many weeks for a letter to reach the person it was addressed to.
Finally, about two hundred years ago, Benjamin Franklin was made postmaster for all the colonies. His first act was to make a long journey to find out the best routes for carrying the mail. Then he set up a line of post station between the northern and southern colonies. He ordered his postriders to travel by night as well as by day.
Franklin’ s postriders could carry more letters in a shorter time from one colony to another. The letter service helped the young American colonies learn more about each other. They learned that they were all interested in the same things. This gave them the feeling of unity that later helped them win their independence.
In time, the nation set up its own government. But there were still only seventy five post offices in the whole country. Between cities along the coast, mail was sent in sailing boats. But most letters were carried from one post office to another in stagecoaches. Trips were three times a week in summer and twice a week in winter . The stage stopped in all towns. Large and small. It stopped fifteen minutes in a small town and two hours in a larger one. But still the people of the town might reach the post office too late to catch the stagecoach. Sometimes, too, the drivers forgot the mail or even lost it. It still took a week for news to go from Washington D. C. to New York.
Today an airmail letter can travel across the world in much less time than that, let alone the e-mail through computers. A modern post office handles more mail in a day than the colonial carriers handled in a whole year. You know that the letter you send will go anywhere you want it to go, and whenever.
选项
答案
A neighbor
解析
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/hgWd777K
本试题收录于:
公共英语五级笔试题库公共英语(PETS)分类
0
公共英语五级笔试
公共英语(PETS)
相关试题推荐
Howlongdidthedebatelast?
Thereareseveralthingsaboutmotorcyclingthattheaveragecitizendislikes.Acyclist’s(31)hassomethingtodowiththisdi
ArecenttrialhasgotridofAmerican’sinterestintheproblemofviolenceagainstwomen.
LincolnUniversity,beginningasaschoolofagriculture,istheoldestinstitutioninthecommonwealth.
Whatisyourresponsibilitywhenyou,asaschoolprincipal,gettheteacher’sreport?
Whatisyourresponsibilitywhenyou,asaschoolprincipal,gettheteacher’sreport?
Themovementofthesuncreatesperiodsof______.
WorldleadersmetrecentlyatUnitedNationsheadquartersinNewYorkCitytodiscusstheenvironmentalissuesraisedattheRio
InwhichstatewasEmilyDicksonborn?
InwhichstatewasEmilyDicksonborn?
随机试题
消费税法规定,实行从价定率征税的应税消费品,其计税依据是不含消费税和增值税的销售额。()
战汗治疗时应阴虚火旺型盗汗治疗时宜
在仪表的下列特性中,()不属于静态特性。
某酒店位于I类声环境功能区,设有娱乐场所,据《社会生活环境噪声排放标准》,关于娱乐场所通过建筑结构传播至该酒店客房内的再生排放限值的说法,正确的是()。
下列关于水利工程分包的说法,正确的有()。
甲、乙二人为夫妻(户籍所在地为H市大河区),二人于2018年10月以150万元的价格购置H市理光区彩霞路一套房屋。2019年2月初,乙赴外地出差,住H市文化区的丙找到甲,称过去已看过该房,愿以160万元价格买下,甲不同意;经协商,甲决定以170万元价格出售
行政职权必须基于法律的授予才能存在,必须依据法律规范行使,这体现了行政法基本原则中的()。
根据以下资料。回答下列问题。2004—2008年我国文化产业增加值分别为3340亿元、4216亿元、5123亿元、6412亿元、7600亿元,逐年大幅度攀升,平均增长速度高达17%以上,比同期GDP增值高10个百分点左右,不仅高于传统产业的增长速
实用新型申请专利时应当具备的创造性是指:同申请日以前已有的技术相比,该实用新型有()。
SouthAfricahas11officiallanguages.Ifyouwanttosayhello,it’s"sawubona"inZulu,and"hallo"inAfrikaans.Now,South
最新回复
(
0
)